SIEF Workshops
- • September 21-25, 2009 – Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina
- • July 20-24, 2009 – Beijing, China
- • March 8-12, 2009 – Amman, Jordan
- • January 26-30, 2009 – Lima, Peru
- • December 1-5, 2008 – Manila, Philippines
- • June 23-27, 2008 - Madrid, Spain
- • March 3-7, 2008 - Managua, Nicaragua
- • January 13-17, 2008 - Cairo, Egypt
SIEF’s priority agenda includes conducting 5 regional workshops per year designed to provide customized training in impact evaluation fundamentals. Participants are represented by joint teams of government officials, local researchers and World Bank task teams who are working together on the design of new World Bank-supported projects. The goal is to equip these teams with the knowledge and technical skills needed to build high quality impact evaluation into project design. Consistent, rigorous evaluation of innovative, new government programs will build an evidence base for better HD policy that will benefit all developing countries and enhance aid effectiveness.
Causal Impact
Impact Evaluation (IE) measures a program’s effectiveness by comparing the target outcomes of beneficiaries against a control group - both before and after project implementation. The central challenge for rigorous IE is to develop a credible counterfactual – establishing what would have happened to the beneficiaries had they not been exposed to the program. A reliable counterfactual comes from identifying a comparison (or control) group of participants which is as similar as possible (both observably and unobservably) to those benefiting from the program.
Evidence from credible impact evaluations is one of the most powerful tools available to policymakers for improving the design of programs and policies. Reliable IE results also allow policymakers and donors to better allocate funds across competing programs. Unlike other forms of evaluation, rigorous IEs allow for the attribution of observed changes in outcomes to the program being evaluated.
SIEF Workshops Topics
• Why evaluate and the causality of the problem
• Using evaluation results for decision making
• Linking monitoring systems/data and impact evaluation
• Mainstreaming impact evaluation and evidence-based policy into government systems
• Impact evaluation methodologies
• Designing and planning an evaluation
• Managing an evaluation
• Dealing with operational constraints
SIEF Workshops
Workshops are organized into plenary, parallel and small group sessions. The plenary sessions are for all participants, while the parallel sessions are divided between policymaker and technical track sessions.
Policymaker Sessions are designed for stakeholders working in an operational capacity and responsible for oversight, implementation and logistics of impact evaluations. These sessions provide a theoretical foundation for identifying causality and different evaluation methodologies. The Policymaker Sessions also cover practical techniques for building high quality impact evaluations into new programs - including results-based monitoring, sample design, roll-out strategies and operational tools.
Technical Track Sessions are geared toward professionals who want to deepen their knowledge of theoretical econometric estimation methodologies and lead in the design of impact evaluations. These sessions
cover advanced econometric and statistical techniques and case studies that illustrate the clear link between theory and practice.
Small Group Sessions reinforce the material covered in the parallel tracks and foster participation and interaction among participants. Assigned moderators work with each group to guide the conversation and provide technical support. During the workshops, project teams develop rigorous impact evaluation designs for their own projects and present their designs to the larger group for feedback.
Workshop Ripple Effect
One of the best indicators of SIEF workshop success is demonstrated by continued regional and national interest in follow-up workshops. Thus far, the SIEF seminars in Cairo and Managua have resulted in national workshops to be held in Tunisia, Algeria and Macedonia. The Tunisia workshop is scheduled to include over 100 participants.
Back to Spanish-World Bank Trust Fund for Impact Evaluation (SIEF)
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